Dmitry Medvedev held a meeting of the Presidential Council for the Development of the Information Society.

Photo by the Presidential Press Service

February 12, 2009
MOSCOW KREMLIN. At a meeting of the Presidential Council for the Development of the Information Society.

The head of state pointed to the unacceptably low level of development of information and communication technologies (ICT) in Russia. Despite the availability of intellectual resources and the fairly rapid proliferation of new technologies and telecommunications in recent years, the lag behind the countries leading in this area is only increasing.
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The situation with extremely inefficient use of ICT by the authorities and the actual absence of so-called e-government require special attention. In this regard, the President urged the responsible departments to do everything so that the Federal Law “On ensuring access to information on the activities of state bodies and local self-government bodies” signed on February 9 will be launched in the very near future.

The meeting approved a number of proposals for the implementation of the Information Society Development Strategy in Russia. In particular, eight working groups will be created: on the formation of an accessible information and communication structure; on the use of ICT in education and science; in the field of health and social protection; to ensure the safety of the population; on national ICT industry issues; on the e-government project; on the use of ICT in the field of culture and cultural heritage; on issues of countering the use of ICT in order to damage the national interests of Russia. A separate working group will develop the use of information and communication technologies in the regions.



D.MEDVEDEV: Good afternoon, colleagues! Sit down please.

Already sent a note - well, it means that there is a desire to work.

Good day again, colleagues! Today we have gathered at the first meeting of our Council for the Development of the Information Society. The decree on its creation was signed in November last year. I hope, naturally, that this Council will play a role in the development of the information society itself, in the development of the Strategy that exists, and in the development of concrete plans.

It is obvious that today no progress and modernization are possible without information technologies, this also applies to the scientific and technical sphere, and not only the scientific and technical sphere, but also management issues themselves and even the issues of strengthening democracy in the country. Today it is impossible to imagine any enterprise, any company that does not have computers, does not have an automated accounting system - in one way or another, in any case. Well, to a considerable extent, it is already impossible to imagine the activities of our business, our companies without the Internet. Telecommunication services are provided both in cities and in rural areas, and it is gratifying that after all we have a computer in every fourth Russian family.

In recent years, information technology and information services have become a fairly significant article of Russian non-primary exports, reaching a level of approximately one billion dollars. Nevertheless, for the sake of what we created this Council, for which we are meeting? All this does not suit us, because according to key indicators we are still terribly far from most developed countries. In the corresponding international rankings, Russia takes (I myself, when I looked at the materials, was surprised) not even the 20-30th, but 70-80th places! This is despite the fact that we have a very high overall historical intellectual potential, interest in this area, a lot of programmers. The lag behind the leading countries does not decrease, but paradoxically, under the conditions of seemingly economic development and overall improvement in life, on the contrary, it is growing. According to the development index of the so-called e-government, we were in 56th place in 2005, and in 2007 we reached 92nd. What does this mean? This suggests that we do not have any e-government, all of this is a chimera. In the rating of countries' readiness for the networked world (there is such a rating) we are also in the “honorable” 72nd place.

About e-government. Today, almost all federal structures are provided with modern computers and are connected to the Internet. Practically in all state bodies databases are formed, but only that. We have an internal document flow both conducted and maintained on paper. And computers are mainly used, you know, for what: in fact, these are typewriters, just more convenient, because you do not need to reprint the same thing every time.

We have been translating our work to electronic form for the fifth year already. That is, for five years now we have all been involved in electronic document circulation. In fact, even more, because I, working in the Presidential Administration about six or seven years ago, tried to do this in the Administration - without success. Then we did it in the Government. Unfortunately, in this sense there is nothing to boast.

There are no modern planning systems, and modern systems of financial and management reporting. Only on the mailing of regulatory documents to the departments every month tons of paper go. So now nobody does it - we are just rich: we have a lot of wood and enough paper.

For citizens in most cases nothing has changed. With rare exceptions, there is no possibility at all to send any application from a personal computer or follow the passage of your paper in one or another department, to receive an electronic certificate on the electronic single window system. We had to create a single portal of state and municipal services, he had to earn from January 1 of the coming year. This also did not happen. It was supposed to be a website where citizens could fully receive information on all the services of federal, regional and municipal government structures.

Nevertheless, on February 9, I signed a law on providing access to information on the activities of state bodies and local governments. We have to make it work in the very near future.

The strategy for the development of the information society was adopted in February last year, a year has passed - its plan, unfortunately, has not been finalized. The motion algorithm for this problem today we must discuss and find.

I know that there is a proposal to create a number of interdepartmental groups that will be responsible for specific areas of work. It seems to me that this is a normal, in any case reasonable, idea, let's discuss it.

I would like us to think about other fundamental points. So, in the global information society, naturally, the one who is able to produce value-added cost-effectively, taking into account the long-term growth trend of information resources, the role of technology and services, is successful.

Today, the lion’s share of all services we consume is imports, while domestic software products, in some areas, at least, although very important, are leaders in developed countries, and our students win the most prestigious programming competitions every year. . Let's discuss what needs to be done in this area, what kind of support and in what forms is needed here.

There are a number of other problems that I will mention - after that, the colleagues will probably develop this in their speeches. The issue of infrastructure constraints, including the so-called conversion of the radio frequency spectrum, has been on the agenda since 2006. Here it is necessary that all heads of relevant departments finally complete interdepartmental coordination: they either meet at the level of departments or hold a meeting in the Government.

Another topic is information technologies in the social sphere. Now we need to start mass education of school teachers for new technologies. We actually tried to do it in the framework of a national project. Probably, something has been done, but for now this is only the very beginning. We need to think about how to move on - to use domestic free software. I dealt with this topic, we have the results, we have already prepared our own programs that allow us to create, in fact, a product of absolutely qualitative, based on free software, but already tied to our realities.

It is necessary to create distance training centers for disabled children who study at home, and, of course, to provide all these children with computers and Internet access. This is also a very important task.

In healthcare, we have also spoken many times already, and certain attempts have been made - it is necessary to move on to keeping a medical history in electronic form, to unify social cards and other forms of accounting. We also need, of course, digitalization programs for large archives, library and museum collections. I also did this myself, and I hope that this work will also be carried out to the end - and in order to prevent the losses that exist in our archives and in our museum fund, and just to put things in order. A system is also needed to record the results of research and development work carried out with budget funds.

Another important issue that we all face when driving around our home country is overcoming the digital divide. I remember back in 2000 at the G8, which was in Japan, this question was posed in relation to overcoming the digital divide in the world. We also have a digital divide. We have a very big country and very different possibilities. Therefore, the digital inequality of the Russian regions is a rather serious, important topic. We have taken certain steps in this direction - in any case, when the decision was made and implemented to connect all schools of the Russian Federation to the Internet: the task was ambitious, even some people didn’t believe in it, nevertheless did, did it quickly enough, for reasonable money . But we need to overcome this inequality in all aspects. Schools, of course, are the most important link, but we have other social institutions, we just have users, our ordinary citizens, and we understand that the ability to connect to the Internet for reasonable money in Moscow is one, and somewhere in the outback - fundamentally different, and the income there is different.

Of course, now I will not list all the problems that are associated with the nature of the development of the information society in our country. But what I have already mentioned is quite enough to make a simple conclusion: there is enough work for everyone.

Despite the crisis difficulties, in the next two years we must create both informational and institutional prerequisites for integration into the global information society. This is the main task of the Council and this is the main function of the departments represented here.

Tasks are set. Let's share our impressions now.

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